Ćwierćwiecze bitwy o dusze

Andrzej Koraszewski

Bin Laden ukrywał się długo pod opieką pakistańskich „sojuszników” Ameryki. Czy osobiście wymyślił ten zamach, czy realizował czyjś pomysł? Tego nie wiemy. Spektakularną bitwę na ziemi Wielkiego Szatana musiano planować długo. Dobór wykonawców – inteligentnych, zdolnych, dobrze wykształconych, gotowych poświęcić życie dla Allaha – wymagał pomocy najlepszych specjalistów. Czekała ich długa praktyka na symulatorach, staranna analiza systemu bezpieczeństwa na lotniskach. Organizatorzy musieli mieć pewność ich bezwzględnej wierności.

Zwycięstwo było wielkie – podniosło morale całej ummy, czyli „narodu islamskiego”. Wyznawcy Allaha upokorzyli Wielkiego Szatana. Zasiali strach wśród niewiernych. W wojnie o dusze czas nie ma znaczenia, a śmierć jest nagrodą, biletem do raju. Oni kochają życie, my kochamy wieczność – zapewniają muzułmańscy duchowni. Umieramy z imieniem Allaha na ustach. My chcemy Boga, w książce, w szkole, on naszym królem, on nasz Pan.

Po arabsku to brzmi inaczej – zasiej terror w sercach niewiernych – planeta ma się poddać.

Ci wspaniali mężczyźni we wspaniałych porwanych latających maszynach prawdopodobnie setki razy pokonywali te same trasy, wielokrotnie rozbijali się o te same budynki, zabijając siebie i tysiące innych. Kiedy wsiedli do prawdziwych samolotów, reszta była rutyną, robili to już tyle razy. Czy w symulatorach też odmawiali modlitwy? Nie można tego wykluczyć, to wręcz niemal pewne.

Zamach 11 września jest źródłem nieustającej chwały Allaha i jego bohaterów. Cios zadany Ameryce potwierdzał, że Allah jest największy. Zapytałem wykształconą młodą kobietę, czy kojarzy datę 11 września. Spojrzała na mnie niepewnie. Kiedy powiedziałem, że chodzi mi o zamach samolotami pasażerskimi w Ameryce, odpowiedziała, że coś czytała. Starszy przyjaciel pamiętał doskonale – usłyszał informację, jadąc w samochodzie, i nie mógł uwierzyć. Najbardziej rozwinięty kraj świata i banda fanatycznych obdartusów. Zapytałem innego znajomego, który często lata samolotami, czy wykrywacze metalu na lotniskach kojarzą mu się z islamem. Odpowiedział pytaniem, czy mam na myśli bandę Arafata i serię porwań samolotów przez jego ludzi. Te bramki nie budzą już zdziwienia ani pytań. W umysłach ludzi młodszych istnieją przecież od niepamiętnych czasów.

Systemy bezpieczeństwa mają zawsze jakieś luki. Terroryści mogą ich szukać bez końca, mają możliwość podejmowania niezliczonej liczby prób. Mają silną motywację, przekonanie o własnej wyższości moralnej, mają dostęp do ogromnych ilości pieniędzy. Najbardziej niebezpieczne wydaje się przekonanie, że fanatycy są ludźmi prymitywnymi, głupszymi od nas. W społeczeństwach totalitarnych ludzki potencjał kierowany jest na podbój świata. Taka obietnica apeluje do ludzkiej duszy. Będziesz panem życia i śmierci. Muzułmanie są najlepszym narodem Allaha, niewierni mogą się nawrócić albo zostać ścięci. Nic nowego, tyle że teraz to najmocniej wydaje się działać właśnie w tej kulturze. Tak niedawno najlepszymi byli blondyni o niebieskich oczach, współczujący ubogim komuniści, a jeszcze wcześniej inni, gotowi na męczeństwo dla Wielkiej Sprawy. Banalność zwykłego życia jest słabą inspiracją dla wzniosłej duszy.

Od starożytności zastanawiano się, gdzie dusza ma siedzibę w ciele – serce czy głowa? Przecież nie palec, chociaż palec może wskazać, kogo zabić, kogo tylko zniewolić, a przed kim uciekać. Nasi przodkowie nie mogli wiedzieć, że dusza jest w każdej komórce naszego ciała. Nasz jednostkowy lub, jak wolą uczeni, haploidalny genom to zestaw odziedziczonych cech, skłonności, które będzie wzmacniać lub osłabiać kultura. Jest tam stała mieszanka – skłonność do gniewu i tkliwości, przemoc i sadyzm tuż obok czułości, gwałtowność i namysł. Dusza może się zmieniać pod wpływem choroby, przypadkowych zdarzeń, obsesji spowodowanej traumą. Indoktrynacja jest narzędziem skutecznym. Chcemy wierzyć, że myślimy samodzielnie, że mamy własne poglądy, że jesteśmy dobrzy. Czasami uciekamy od siebie, budując nowe ja. Są byli komuniści, byli naziści, byli muzułmanie.

Dziwna rocznica. Ćwierć wieku terroru? Terror jest znacznie starszy, towarzyszy nam od zarania dziejów. Okrucieństwo ma sparaliżować silniejszego wroga. Jest metodą, do której trzeba dorobić moralną teorię.

11 września i 7 października łączy ta sama Idea – zasiej strach w sercach niewiernych – tak każe Księga religii pokoju. Mały chłopiec stoi z wielkim plakatem z napisem informującym, że dla pokoju na świecie Izrael musi zostać zniszczony.

Jak wyjaśnić, dlaczego sprzeciw wobec tej Wielkiej Sprawy jest dziś testem człowieczeństwa? Dlaczego kłamstwa o Izraelu apelują do najmroczniejszych zakątków duszy, zarówno w Afryce, jak i nad Wisłą? Kłamstwa o Żydach służą mobilizacji przeciw niewiernym, utrwalaniu przekonania, że niewierni sieją zepsucie, a Żydzi są niewiernymi bardziej niż ktokolwiek inny. Pies Pawłowa ślini się na dźwięk dzwonka, który słyszał tak często. Ten akurat dzwonek dzwonił od dziesiątków pokoleń, więc dusze reagują automatycznie. Ślinotok wiecznie żywy.

Allah jest największy, Bin Laden zwyciężył. W utrwalaniu zwycięstwa pomagają ludzie dobrej woli, ogromnie ekumenicznie, bez obaw, wręcz przeciwnie, zdobiąc co nieludzkie czarno-białą kefią.

W niedzielę idę na chrzest niemowlęcia. Kim będzie? W jakim świecie dożyje starości? Jak świat będzie obchodził setną rocznicę tamtego zamachu? Tak wiele pytań bez żadnej odpowiedzi.

Two screens, one choice: The lie of ‘Naza’ and the truth of ‘Fauda’

Fiamma Nirenstein

Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor pose with the Special Jury Prize for “Naza” at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival in Italy, on Sept. 12, 2026. Photo by Stephane Cardinale/Corbis via Getty Images.

I was there. And in a sense, I have been inside both films.

The first is “Naza,” an Israeli movie that won the Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival and received an astonishing 25-minute standing ovation on Saturday.

Do not be deceived by the applause.

The creators are themselves Jews and Israelis. That creates a double deception: The film can be presented to international audiences not merely as an accusation against Israel, but as an accusation seemingly validated from within Israeli society itself.

Yet they employ against the Jews one of the oldest weapons in the arsenal of antisemitism: a blood libel.

I investigated the Israel Defense Forces’ war on the ground, including the deaths of civilians that “Naza” depicts as the consequence of a deliberate policy of cruelty and extermination.

The truth is the opposite.

Then there is the second screen: Netflix, where millions of viewers around the world are watching the TV series “Fauda.” It is a magnificent series, and in its latest season, it confronts an international audience with something many people have never truly understood: the horror of Oct. 7, 2023.

In the aftermath of the Hamas massacre, I visited the burned-out kibbutzim. I walked through the homes of murdered young people and saw blood in kindergartens. I saw the dead piled up. I listened to parents and children and heard testimony about rape and other atrocities.

These are the two screens now before us: the lie and the truth.

The reception given to “Naza” in Venice tells us something disturbing about a cultural milieu apparently eager to believe the worst accusations against the Jewish state. The anonymous voices in the film who claim that Israel made a decision to target civilians make accusations that my own experience contradicts. My witnesses are not anonymous.

At Tze’elim, I entered the high-tech command tents from which soldiers are directed building by building, house by house and tunnel by tunnel.

Asaf, a 51-year-old colonel, and other soldiers explained to me how instructions are issued in real time: Stop. Advance. Change route. Destroy. Avoid.

The purpose is twofold: to protect Israeli soldiers and to protect civilians.

That is the opposite of the picture presented by “Naza.”

Indeed, the more I have investigated Israel’s conduct of this war, the more convinced I have become of something extraordinary: Never in the history of warfare has an army done so much to try to protect the civilian population of its enemy. Never.

I also met the lawyers whose job is to determine, according to international law, whether a threat to life emanating from a tower, an underground tunnel or even a hospital makes a target lawful.

War is terrible. Civilians die. Gaza has suffered enormously. But suffering does not prove an Israeli policy of deliberately killing civilians. To turn the tragedy of war into an accusation that Jews deliberately thirst for innocent blood is something much older and darker.

That is why the applause in Venice matters. Twenty-five minutes of applause for a blood libel.

And then there is “Fauda.”

In episodes seven and eight, viewers encounter the Oct. 7 massacre in a way that millions around the world have never seen it before.

Most of the public has never watched the 53 minutes of footage from the massacre that many journalists and officials have seen, much of it recorded by the Hamas terrorists themselves. Perhaps they should have.

After Oct. 7, I spoke with Avida. Trapped in a shelter with one leg severed, he saw his wife, Dana, and 15-year-old Carmel murdered. Carmel told him: “Dad, bury me with my surfboard.” Avida survived with 13-year-old Hadar.

I spoke with Nir, the father of 6-year-old Amit, who had been kidnapped.

“He’s a Juventus fan,” he told me. “He’s smart. You’ll see, he’ll make it through, and then I’ll take him to Italy.”

At the same time, the Bibas children were in the hands of Hamas. They, too, became symbols of what happened when the terrorists crossed into Israel on Oct. 7.

Now the world has two screens before it.

On one, “Naza” receives a jury prize and prolonged applause in Venice for presenting Israel as a country that deliberately kills civilians.

On the other, “Fauda” brings millions of viewers face to face with the savagery that started this war.

Lie and truth.

Deuteronomy tells us: “I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse.”

Perhaps it is time to choose.

And perhaps it is time to choose the truth.

Fiamma Nirenstein is an Italian-Israeli journalist, author and senior research fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs (JCFA). An adviser on antisemitism to Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, she served in the Italian Parliament (2008-2013) as vice president of the Foreign Affairs Committee. A founding member of the Friends of Israel Initiative, she has written 15 books, including October 7, Antisemitism and the War on the West, and is a leading voice on Israel, the Middle East, Europe and the fight against antisemitism.

Kosher Community Fridge in Illinois Dedicated to Murdered Hamas Hostage Hersh Goldberg-Polin

Shiryn Ghermezian

Rachel Goldberg, US-Israeli mother of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, who was taken hostage by Hamas terrorists into Gaza while attending a music festival in southern Israel, holds photos of her son in their home, in Jerusalem, Oct. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Ammar Awad

Szwecja: minister edukacji nosi Gwiazdę Dawida na znak solidarności

Hugh Fitzgerald

25 years after 9/11, memory and resolve endure at Jerusalem memorial

Sharon Altshul

Participants gather at the 9/11 Living Memorial in Jerusalem’s Arazim Valley to mark the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Sept. 9, 2026. Photo by Sharon Altshul.

As the sun descended over the Judean Hills on Wednesday evening, Sept. 9, roses were placed beside the names of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.

The setting was the 9/11 Living Memorial in Jerusalem’s Arazim Valley, where an American flag rises skyward in the form of a 30-foot (9-meter) bronze flame.

This year’s ceremony was held two days before the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks because Sept. 11 falls on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year.

The passage of a quarter-century has not diminished the meaning of the memorial or the personal grief of those who lost loved ones.

For Suri and Henoch Morgenstern of Woodmere, N.Y., Wednesday night marked their first time attending the annual ceremony at the Jerusalem memorial. Their daughter, Nancy Morgenstern, was among those killed in the World Trade Center.

“Here now, we wanted to talk about Nancy and have her remembered,” Suri told JNS.

Nancy was 32 and the oldest of five children. A vibrant woman who enjoyed cycling and running, she had worked as a travel agent for seven years before becoming an administrative assistant at the Cantor Fitzgerald financial services firm on the 104th floor of the North Tower.

No employee in Cantor Fitzgerald’s offices survived after American Airlines Flight 11 struck the tower.

For the Morgenstern family, the loss was compounded by the agonizing uncertainty that followed. They waited two and a half years before they could finally sit shivah for their daughter.

In August 2002, the family purchased the first ambulance for the Ramot Beit Shemesh community in Nancy’s memory. They have continued to honor her through acts of giving.

On Wednesday night, they stood among hundreds gathered beneath the flame-shaped flag.

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee speaks at a ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks at the 9/11 Living Memorial in Jerusalem, Sept. 9, 2026. Photo by Sharon Altshul.

‘A wake-up call’

“Twenty-five years after the horrific September 11 attacks, we remember the 2,977 innocent lives taken and the families who have carried that loss,” U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee said at the ceremony.

Huckabee began his remarks with a personal memory of his father, a firefighter. As a young boy, he recalled visiting the fire station and sliding down the pole.

That memory took on a different meaning as he spoke about the firefighters and first responders who ran toward the burning buildings on Sept. 11.

“It was a wake-up call,” Huckabee said, emphasizing the courage of those who responded to the attacks.

Among the stories of extraordinary bravery was that of Rick Rescorla, head of security for Morgan Stanley. Thanks to evacuation planning and regular drills, approximately 2,700 Morgan Stanley employees in the South Tower were able to escape.

Rescorla returned to the building to help others. He never came out.

For Huckabee, honoring that day means remembering not only those whose lives were taken but also those who understood that their responsibility was to run toward danger while others ran away.

The toll continues

That responsibility, speakers emphasized, did not end on Sept. 11, 2001.

Professor Marc Wilkenfeld, a board-certified specialist in occupational and environmental medicine, has spent the past 25 years treating 9/11 first responders and studying the long-term health consequences of exposure to the toxic environment created by the attacks. After making aliyah, he continued his work in Jerusalem at Hadassah Medical Center Ein Kerem’s Occupational Health Department.

Speaking to JNS, Wilkenfeld stressed that the death toll from 9/11 did not end that morning.

“More than 9,000 more have died since,” he said. “Thousands more struggle with cancer, PTSD and lung disease. These are still people we have to care for.”

The legacy of Sept. 11 was also reflected in the presence at the ceremony of American and Israeli firefighters, police representatives and U.S. military personnel.

Israel Police spokesperson Dean Elsdunne told JNS that while the nature of the terrorist threat has changed over the past 25 years, the principle of confronting it has not.

“The threats have evolved over 25 years, but the alliance between Israel and the U.S. hasn’t changed,” he said.

“For those of us in uniform, ‘Never Forget’ isn’t just a phrase for a ceremony. It’s how we operate.”

An ‘unbreakable bond’

The ceremony also highlighted the enduring U.S.-Israel relationship.

Eyal Ostrinsky, chairman of Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-Jewish National Fund, said the two countries share an “unbreakable bond.”

Russell Robinson, CEO of Jewish National Fund-USA, spoke of turning dreams into reality, planting trees and refusing to allow terrorism to destroy hope.

“Hope is more powerful than terrorism,” he said, calling on people to live lives of meaning and purpose.

The memorial embodies that connection.

Established in 2009 by KKL-JNF and JNF-USA, it is the only memorial outside the United States displaying the names of all those killed in the 9/11 attacks. Created by Israeli artist Eliezer Weishoff together with KKL-JNF landscape architect Yechiel Cohen, the bronze sculpture depicts the American flag transforming into a flame.

A piece of steel recovered from the ruins of the World Trade Center is incorporated into its base.

Around it are the names, arranged alphabetically, each representing a life, a family and a story.

Five Israelis were among those killed: Alona Avraham, Leon Lebor, Daniel Lewin, Shai Levinhar and Hagai Shefi.

As darkness settled over the Judean Hills, representatives of KKL-JNF, JNF-USA and the U.S. embassy jointly lit the memorial torch. Wreaths were placed at the foot of the flame, aided by U.S. Marines and Israeli firefighters.

The Israel Police Orchestra and Special in Uniform band performed, while the Heart of Nova group brought another layer of remembrance to the ceremony.

Tali Binar and Guy Ben-Shimon, survivors of the Supernova music festival massacre on Oct. 7, 2023, performed alongside Ofri Nahum, whose sister Nitzan was murdered in the attack.

American actress Patricia Heaton at a ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks at the 9/11 Living Memorial in Jerusalem, Sept. 9, 2026. Photo by Sharon Altshul.

American actress Patricia Heaton also participated, reciting a poem at the memorial ceremony before returning to the United States.

The connection between two generations of terrorism was underscored by a 27-year-old U.S. Army veteran whose mother worked at the Pentagon on Sept. 11. Five of her mother’s colleagues were killed. In all, 59 passengers and crew aboard American Airlines Flight 77 and 125 people at the Pentagon were killed when the hijacked plane struck the building.

The juxtaposition was impossible to miss: a memorial to the victims of one generation of terrorism standing in a country still confronting the consequences of another.

Yet the evening was not solely about grief. It was about memory and resolve—remembering those who were murdered, those who survived, those who rushed toward danger, those who became ill years later and those who continue to confront terrorism today.

In the fading light, visitors moved along the memorial wall, stopping at individual names to place red roses. Twenty-five years after the deadliest terrorist attack in American history, the names remain etched in stone—and the obligation to remember endures.